1. Field
The present disclosure relates generally to composite structures and, in particular, to a method and apparatus for modeling composite structures at different structural levels.
2. Background
Composite materials are being used more and more often in various structures for platforms. For example, aircraft are being designed and manufactured with greater and greater percentages of composite materials. Some aircraft may have more than 50 percent of their primary structure made from composite materials.
Composite materials are often used in platforms, such as aircraft, to decrease the weight of the platform. This decreased weight may improve payload capacities and fuel efficiencies. Further, the use of composite structures may provide for longer service life for various components in an aircraft.
The composite materials used in composite structures may be created by combining two or more dissimilar components. For example, a composite material used in a composite structure may include fibers and resins. The fibers may be part of the tape, and the resins may be impregnated in the tape. The fibers and resins may be combined and cured to form the composite structure.
When designing composite structures, testing is often performed on these structures. Lab testing often is time consuming, expensive, inflexible, and includes unknown factors. With these problems and costs, only limited testing is currently performed on composite structures. As a result, structural designs may not be fully optimized, because there is presently no way to fully explore the different ways in which a composite structure can be constructed.
For example, a composite structure may be tested with a number of different types of fibers and resins using a number of different types of layup angles and layers. Each configuration of resins, fibers, layup angles, and number of plies requires time and expense for testing. As a result, as the number of configurations increase, the amount of time and expense needed to test configurations for composite structures increases.
Therefore, it would be advantageous to have a method and apparatus which takes into account one or more of the issues discussed above, as well as possibly other issues.